To-day one half of Europe thinks that the other half has long been and
still is superstitious. The Protestants regard the relics, the
indulgences, the mortifications, the prayers for the dead, the holy
water, and almost all the rites of the Roman Church, as a superstitious
dementia. Superstition, according to them, consists in taking useless
practices for necessary practices. Among the Roman Catholics there are
some more enlightened than their ancestors, who have renounced many of
these usages formerly considered sacred; and they defend themselves
against the others who have retained them, by saying: "They are
indifferent, and what is merely indifferent cannot be an evil."
It is difficult to mark the limits of superstition. A Frenchman
travelling in Italy finds almost everything superstitious, and is hardly
mistaken. The Archbishop of Canterbury maintains that the Archbishop of
Paris is superstitious; the Presbyterians make the same reproach against
His Grace of Canterbury, and are in their turn treated as superstitious
by the Quakers, who are the most superstitious of all in the eyes of
other Christians.
In Christian societies, therefore, no one agrees as to what superstition
is. The sect which seems to be the least attacked by this malady of the
intelligence is that which has the fewest rites. But if with few
ceremonies it is still strongly attached to an absurd belief, this
absurd belief is equivalent alone to all the superstitious practices
observed from the time of Simon the magician to that of Father
Gauffridi.
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